The Birthmark And My Last Duchess Analysis

1574 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Meaning and importance of Brownings My last duchess

“The Birthmark” and “My Last Duchess” are two very different works, from two completely different genres. “The Birthmark” is a short story written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, and “My Last Duchess” is a poem written by Robert Browning. Although, these are two different genres, they have very similar themes and parallels. These works explore the problems with power and control in marriages at two different time periods and places and shows what it can drive a man to do. “The Birthmark” has a lot of symbolism, imagery and allegory. This story is about a pretty normal newlywed couple, Aylmer and Georgiana. “Such a union accordingly took place, and was attended with truly remarkable consequences and a deeply impressive moral. (2)” This quote is very interesting because the word “union” means many things. From one perspective it can mean the marriage between Aylmer and Georgiana, and on the other hand it could refer to the union of Aylmer’s love for Georgiana and science. Aylmer is thoroughly devoted to his career in science, and he was recently married to Georgiana so he is just getting to know what being married is like. The birthmark is the conflict in their marriage and in the story, Aylmer isn’t into Georgiana’s birthmark and he requests for her to allow him to remove it. He soon realizes that taking off the birthmark isn’t as simple as it seems because it is interwoven into Georgiana’s face. Georgiana then allows Aylmer to remove the birthmark, even though she knows he isn’t a successful scientist. The liquid that Aylmer has Georgiana drink slowly kills her, and Aylmer is shown to be a complete fool. The actual birthmark itself is the main symbol used throughout the story. “My Last Duchess” is a poem about a Duke who showing someone ...

... middle of paper ...

...s with his request to remove it. Hawthorne and Browning chose two different developments and extremes of their works. Hawthorne chose to be subtler with his approach to the control in Aylmer and Georgiana’s marriage. On the other hand, Browning chose a more harsh approach to the control between the Duke and his last Duchess. Regardless of the approach, both authors came up with a similar theme which was power and control.
In conclusion, even though both of these works resulted in death, they still represent two completely different genres with a common theme. Two different approaches came up with the same theme which was supported throughout the poem and the short story. Without this aspect of the story, there wouldn’t be a story. Because without these themes there is no conflict in the poem or short story, and without conflict, that leaves a very boring plot.

Show More
Related

  • Rhetorical Devices In The Birthmark

    1416 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Death of the Birthmark-A Quest for Perfection In the short story, “The Birthmark” Nathaniel Hawthorne uses the characters, foreshadowing, symbolism, and other rhetorical devices to alert people of the consequences of man having the power to control and alter nature. Additionally, through his skillful usage of diction, Hawthorne warns of the effects of seeking perfection through science. In “The Birthmark”, Aylmer, a man devoted entirely to science, marries Georgiana, a beautiful young woman with a single imperfection. Georgiana’s imperfection bears the resemblance of a tiny crimson hand and is visible on her left cheek. The birthmark becomes the object of Aylmer’s obsession and he resolves to use his scientific prowess to correct “what Nature left imperfect in her fairest work.”

    Read More

  • Spiritual Analysis in The Birthmark Novel

    1221 Words  | 3 Pages

    In Nathanial Hawthorne’s “The Birth-Mark,” Aylmer, a crazed, “mad-scientist,” seeks to remove the scarlet handprint birthmark from his wife, Georgiana’s cheek. From the opening of the work, the third person narrator describes Aylmer’s obsession with science and the adverse effects it has had on his social life. Aylmer is tied up in this battle within himself and with his assigned association between the natural and the spiritual world. He wishes to have as much control over these colliding worlds as possible, granting himself god-like power and control in the process. In the art of manipulating nature through science, Aylmer believes he is able to alter the spiritual aspects of the natural as well. Aylmer’s focus on spirituality is Hawthorne’s way of commenting on mankind’s fixation on sin and redemption.

    Read More

  • Obsessing About Perfection in The Birthmark

    999 Words  | 2 Pages

    The birthmark is a compelling story of one man’s obsession with his scientific ability to produce perfection. Aylmer, a scientist, is married to a Georgiana who is a very beautiful woman. Not long after getting married Georgiana’s birthmark, which is in the shape of a tiny handprint on her check, really begins to bother Aylmer. He sees it as a flaw in an other wise perfect woman. Georgiana knows that her birthmark disgusts him and, having grown up not bother at all by it, begins to hate it herself. He asks if she has ever considered having it removed. This is not something she has considered since other people in her life, especially men, have always seen it as a “charm”. Aylmer being an amazing scientist almost sees himself as god and feels that he has the power to remove this imperfection. Georgiana, bothered by her husband’s reaction to her birthmark, agrees to let him try to rid her of it. She is taken to his laboratory and he immediately begins to experiment. After she finds Aylmer’s book of experiments, which all end in failure, she for the first time, has some doubt about how this will work and confronts him. He reassures her and begins to try a multitude of methods, with the help of his assistant Aminadab, which do not work. At one point, there are several experiments going on and he even refers to himself as a “sorcerer” (Hawthorne 232). Finally, he produces a potion, which she drinks, and the birthmark begins to disappear! Slowly though, even as the experiment is working, Georgiana is fading away. He finds that ultimately, the birthmark was connected to her very soul and in his trying to act god like he actually kills her. Really this short story just proves that science has its limits and no man should try to act like G...

    Read More

  • Comparing The Birthmark And Rappaccini's Daughter By Nathanial Hawthorne

    588 Words  | 2 Pages

    Nathanial Hawthorne made his opinion on science very clear in all of his stories. His religious beliefs and the beliefs of the people in that time period are portrayed through his stories. The stories that showcase his opinion the clearest are The Birthmark, Dr. Heidegger’s Experiment, Rappaccini’s Daughter. In each one of these short stories, there is a scientific experiment that rebels against religion and religious beliefs. They also try and defy nature and the natural being of a person. Hawthorne believes that science is ultimately weak in comparison to God and the natural beauty of the world.

    Read More

  • The Birthmark Symbolism Essay

    1809 Words  | 4 Pages

    The Birthmark and Symbolism Cloudy headed and conflicted describes Georgina, one of the main characters in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Birthmark.” In this eerie short story Georgina, who is seemingly perfect, is convinced by her husband, Aylmer, who is a scientist obsessed with perfection, that the small birthmark on her face is her only source of imperfection. While others have told her that this birthmark is a sign of magical endowments, Aylmer is disgusted by the sight of the birthmark, referring to it as a defect (Hawthorne 304-5). Georgina is taken aback by this comment and resents her husband for it. As the story progresses, Aylmer convinces Georgina to allow him to try and rid her of the mark.

    Read More

  • Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Birthmark: Understanding The Birthmark

    846 Words  | 2 Pages

    Georgiana is a fine wife, and a seemingly beautiful one, too.  Aylmer expresses deep affection towards his wife, but it is hinted from the beginning that his two passions in life will eventually have to come in conflict.  The meaning of the birthmark shifts suddenly in the end, but in the beginning, it is viewed as Georgiana’s ability to be imperfect and to sin.  It is in the shape of a human hand because an angel supposedly has a grip on her, linking her to the other world.  That is most men’s reactions, but some women viewed it as disastrous to her beauty.  Although Aylmer is not initially concerned with it, it eventually gets to him, obsessively occupying himself with it.  He would stare at it whenever he had a chance, and tried to be candid about it.  When it became apparent that Aylmer was quite concerned with this, Georgiana asked him to elaborate.  He was more disgusted by the mark than Georgiana assessed. Her most significant reply to him was “You cannot love what shocks you!”

    Read More

  • The Birthmark

    883 Words  | 2 Pages

    Every relationship is different. Weather one may be in a relationship with a boy, or just a friend, it is different. Even though they are different, the characters in “The Birthmark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne and “IND AFF” by Fay Weldon are in similar relationships. That is, the male is dominant over the female, and the woman thinks the man is her knight in shining armor. In the beginning of “IND AFF” the unnamed woman thinks her professor, Peter, who she is having an affair with, is her ticket to creating a good thesis and higher standings. Similarly, in “The Birthmark,” Georgiana thinks her husband is her ticket to flawless beauty because he tells her he will remove her birthmark. Obviously, this is not how relationships operate in today’s society. These two relationships compare and contrast with each other as well as with relationships in today’s day-and-age.

    Read More

  • Perspectives of the Obsession with Imperfections

    1212 Words  | 3 Pages

    Aylmer, the protagonist, in “The Birthmark” becomes selfish as a result of his obsession to remove a miniscule birthmark from his beautiful wife’s face in order to achieve perfection. As a consequence of a small and distinct birthmark on his wife’s left cheek, Aylmer frightened, thinks the birthmark is evil that symbolizes sorrow, decay, and death. Although, the birthmark is benign and harmless, that only denotes the flaws that nature has left on a human being, to Aylmer it represents his wife's imperfection, which needs to be fixed and extracted. As a result of attempting to remove the birthmark in order to achieve perfection, Aylmer blinds himself and does not think of the consequences. He dreams of the fatal outcome th...

    Read More

  • The Birthmark

    390 Words  | 1 Pages

    1. Our society tends to be obsessed with the idea of physical perfection. How does our society manifest that obsession? How is the 'Birthmark'; an early version of our modern obsession with physical perfection?

    Read More

  • A Comparison Of Values In Abuela Invents The Zero?

    1399 Words  | 3 Pages

    In the beginning of both of the pieces of literature, the main character(s) have not had the experience that will shape their values yet. Rather, as time moves forward in the stories, the

    Read More

  • The Birthmark Character Analysis Essay

    905 Words  | 2 Pages

    Nathaniel Hawthorne did not do much explaining when it came to the characters involved in "The Birthmark". He did not portray the main characters: Aylmer, Georgiana, and Ambidab as human beings, but rather as symbols. While analyzing the story "The Birthmark", I have achieved some great insight of the author 's articulate writing style; especially, his style of making characters have symbolic meaning. In this story, Hawthorne uses his characters to symbolize specific things. In this ambiguous, short story, the three characters each symbolize Science, Beauty, and Nature. Each character represents an unusual force that has equally worked against each other.

    Read More

  • The Birthmark Theme Essay

    745 Words  | 2 Pages

    One of the main themes discussed in this story is perfection which was evident by Aylmer obsessing over making his wife perfect by removing the birthmark off

    Read More

  • The Birthmark Literary Criticism

    1033 Words  | 3 Pages

    The tone adopted by Hawthorne from the inception of the narrative toward Aylmer urges the reader to respect Aylmer’s scientific ambition—directly his triumph of head over heart, but indirectly his objectification of Georgiana and subsequent attempts to fix something that she never thought was a flaw. Not only is Aylmer’s obsession with getting rid of her birthmark selfish in that he does it for “the sake of giving himself peace” (647) rather than any desire to make his wife happy, he also admits to feeling guilt over his tyrannical treatment of her. For example, his “horror and disgust” in response to her facial blight rarely escapes her notice, and when she reacts poorly to his “convulsive shudder,” he attempts to soothe her and “release her mind from the burden of actual things” (650) as if she is an empty-headed infant in need of a pacifier. Furthermore, in response to her desperate request for its removal, he isolates her from humanity, administers potentially harmful concoctions into her rooms and body without her knowledge, and ultimately—and rapturously—succeeds in shrinking the mark at the cost of her

    Read More

  • Gender Imbalance: Beauty Standards and Exploitation

    1529 Words  | 4 Pages

    Georgina is presented as a figure that could somewhat be considered as the epitome of the beauty of a woman. Rather than viewing the birthmark as a complement to her beauty, he sees it as a flaw that he must get rid of to guarantee that she remains beautiful to him. At no point does he stop to ask her opinion on the issue showing that it did not matter what she thought. All that mattered is that as her husband he did not like the birthmark and thus she had to get rid of it to make him happy. This is a clear indication life in a society where the differences in gender are used to exploit, divide, and isolate women. One of the biggest rifts between men and women in the society even today is the fact that women are expected to meet the ideology

    Read More

  • The Perfection Of Perfection In Georgiana's 'The Birth Mark'

    732 Words  | 2 Pages

    At the beginning of the story, Georgiana is a confident young woman who is admired by many suitors. Unbeknown to her, she marries a man who feels that the mark on her cheek is a fatal flaw and ruins her beauty as a whole. This flagrant emotional abuse causes turmoil for Georgiana that would never have surfaced if not for her husband Aylmer. One night, Aylmer states to his wife, “You came so nearly perfect from the hand of Nature that this slightest possible defect shocks me as being the visible mark of earthly imperfection” (Hunter, 213). This first suggestion that her birthmark was a flaw began a spiral of insecurity. After learning of her husband 's disgust with her face, Georgiana, a girl considered the most beautiful

    Read More

More about The Birthmark And My Last Duchess Analysis

Open Document